So I´ve been avoiding this post for a while because I thought if I didn´t write it, the feeling would just go away. I have lived in the US for more time than I care to admit and by this time I should have US citizenship but due to extenuating circumstances I don´t so if you are a citizen and you are able to vote and you haven´t yet, please do. If you aren´t able to vote in the upcoming US elections:

1. Who do you want to win?, 2. Who do you think will win? 3. Why?

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So I’ve been MIA for a little while. I should probably explain that I have been traveling but really, this is a TCK forum, I think it was a given. In the past few weeks I´ve been to Switzerland, Italy, Morocco, and Barcelona which technically isn´t in another country but I think it would make them happy if I said it was. So yeah, I´m back, for a while, I think I´ve ODed on travel. I´m going to take a break and write down some more observations about Spain.

P.S. I´ve barely spoken Spanish. I need to get on that.

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Throughout my travels, I have come to the conclusion that you can tell a lot about a place by the dogs. I suppose it could be used for any animal but I think the dog is one of the most common “pet”. I have no particular affinity or aversion for/to dogs or animals in particular but that’s neither here nor there.

In Spain, well at least in Granada, lots of people own dogs and while they are not dead ringers for their owners like 101 Dalmations would suggest, they do correspond to the owner’s lifestyle. For example, the majority of people here have “apartment dogs” (think dogs small enough to carry) because, well most people live in apartments. In the US these would be called “yappy dogs” but I have yet to hear a dog bark or display any excitement in Spain.

Then there are the gitano and hippie dogs are usually big. Those people don’t have to worry about the size of their dogs because apparently they live up in Sacromonte which is basically a series of caves. Most of them aren’t “Spanish” they are either Roma people or other european people who come to Spain because it is more liberal and the climate is agreeable (at this time of year)

All the dogs are well behaved, probably because their owners treat them like companions rather than glorified play-things/children as they are treated in the US. Not many people use leashes here but the ones who do usually live in apartments. Their dogs just calmly trot along beside or a little ways in front and go where their owner goes. When the owner goes into a shop, the dog, without being addressed at all, sits calmly outside the door until the owner is ready and then the procession continues.

The relation between man and mans best friend seems a lot more natural here. Also there isn’t so much a culture of neutering here (which I won’t really comment on either way because I don’t really know why it would or wouldn’t be done in a culture in the first place). Owners don’t insist on dressing their dogs in clothes. I don’t know what any of this says about Spain but I’ll figure it out lol. I’m good at the observation, not so much the conclusions.

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Yesterday I wasn’t in a very good mood. I wasn’t in a very bad mood I was just irritated by things to the point where I found them hilarious…which probably means I’m crazy but that’s neither here nor there. Yesterday my particular annoyance was that there are so many American students in Granada. Now I understand that Spanish students don’t really come to the city until October, because they are on holiday, working, or they live in other Spanish cities but that did not stop me from feeling the way I did. Basically, there are just entirely too many Americans here. If feels as though the entire female uni aged population of Columbus, Ohio was airlifted and dropped in to the middle of Granada like some kind of preppy collegiate bomb. Which led me, yesterday, to refer to Granada as Columbus Spain. Ohio is not just an arbitrary place, there are a lot of girls from Ohio State on my program so it as the first place I thought of. Nevermind that there is probably a town or city called Columbus in Spain.

Basically, I was foolish. When I decided to come here, I did not think about the number of other people who were going to come to Granda too. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve made some great friends, friends that I will still be in contact with if I am to grow old but I didn’t come all the way to Spain to make friends with girls from Ohio if you know what I mean.

It gets better. Not only am I not living with Spanish people (which was what I wanted to do) but the 3 girls that I’m living with are alll….ALLL American. I even lived with one of them last year at my “home” university.

I found this all hilarious…

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I’ve been avoiding writing this post for a long time because I didn’t know how to write it without sounding like some sort of self entitled Princess. This is supposed to simply be an observation rather than a whiney tantrum in writing but you can give me feedback at the end of this if you would like.

When I was little I used to get upset when my mother left me to stay overnight with my grandparents while she went out or on holiday. When she asked me why I didn’t like it, I would say “because they treat me like family”. They tell us that our Senora is like our Spanish mom. I disagree; she is the lady who opened her home to me for a fee through my program and for that reason, she does not treat me like family, which I love.

The homestay is a different but not altogether disagreeable arangement for me. It wasn’t what I signed up for, I wanted to live in a “residencia” which is basically a privately owned dorm so that I could get to know other Spanish students. My living situation (and the time of year) means that I have only met one Spanish student.

So about my homestay. I live with a 63 year old woman in her appartment. She is really nice and interesting. I suppose she is also sort of a TCK. She was born in the Sahara and lived a Spanish city in Morroco before her father died when she was 8. Then she moved to Galicia and then to Granada where she has remained for over 40 years. She basically does everything for me, which I appreciate but I like being able to do things for myself.

There only a few things that I miss (clearly, I’m a TCK). I miss doing my own laundry, I miss Spanish food (If you are puzzling over this one, you’ll have your answer soon) and I miss internet. That’s it. I think that means that I miss the independence.

So the food. Spanish food is delicious but that’s not what I’m getting. What I get is the equivalent of “chicken and stars” at least once a day (caned diced spaghetti in a salty chicken broth), cream cheese on bread, frozen pizza, frozen french fries/chips and canned tuna. I thinks the extend of the variety, in short, food universally accepted as the reason for childhood obesity in the USA. All the food at my homestay is so unbelieveably salty. My Senora has a box full of salt next to the stove which she uses to season everything. Not a pinch here and a pinch there, half a handful on everything. The amount of salt she uses for one meal, I would have at home in a week. To the point that by the time I leave here I will probably have a heart condition. So maybe I’m complaining about the food but everyone else in my group is baffled by the “food” I’m getting. My Sra. said that since she separated from her husband, that’s how she eats… You might be thinking to yourself “how sad, what can you possibly say to that?” I still haven’t found the words.

She talks a lot which is good for developing my Spanish conversation skills and my vocab. Usually we talk over Spanish dubbed Lifetime movies. Something about them being Spanish instead of English makes me forget how awful they are. I’m having a good time in general. It’s just a much different time than I would have expected. Anyway. I have to go to lunch….here’s to hoping its not chicken and stars.

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I don´t know how many of you smoke or don´t. I for one don´t and I´m not about to start but I´m indifferent to smoking (unless I´m locked into a figurative iron maiden of smoke or if I get burned by someone carelessly wielding their cigarette as if it were a magic wand of expression). In fact, one of the (many) smells that I associate with travel is cigarette smoke to the point where smelling it will bring on nostalgia for the beach or a city or something. However, I do realize that there are people much more sensitive to smoking than I am (most of the rest of the people in my group for example). That said, my views on smokers in ¨my¨ culture tend to be negative whereas in other cultures I accept it. Probably because in many other cultures smoking is accepted as a norm. For example, ¨no smoking¨´signs are just for decoration and restaurants don´t really have a smoking or non smoking section. What do you think?

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Airline Magazine? Check!

In flight shopping magazine? Check!

Safety card? Check

Sick bag?…………..Sick bag? Anyone Bueller?

So of late, I´ve noticed the lack of sick bags on airplanes. I think its been happening for a while and I just ignored it because I didn´t want to believe (and perhaps because I´ve never used one) but now the naked truth has been thrust in front of my eyes that my paper companion is no more….or nearing extinction. Maybe its just on the airlines I have traveled on; I´m uninformed either way. What do you think about the demise of the sickbag?

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Well damn, its happened. The question I was dreading this whole time in Spain. Well it happens nearly everyday actuallly. I start speaking Spanish with a friend and I get the question in broken English to match my broken Spanish ¨you are American?¨ I usually answer by rolling my eyes and shrugging (an involuntary reaction that I was made aware of by one of my new found friends from my trip). Now I am not surprised. My accent (in any language) takes the shape of whoever I am around. My word usage is mixed to the point that even when I speak my native language of English people are confused as to where I am from because I speak in nonspecific dialect with a myriad of words native to countries that I am not in. I´m not upset that people think I am American. I can admit that I am not fluent in Spanish and that really I haven´t even been trying since I´ve been here but I´m not sure that I want people to automatically assume that I´m American….which I´m not. I´m a ¨British¨ tck with an American accent….sometimes

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Ok I realize it has been a long time but my internet access has been….precarious at best. So today I want to talk about wedding rings because it has come up a lot in Spain.

On this trip with 33 American girls, 3 American guys I have realized how much American´s are invested in wedding rings. A number of the girls were looking quizzically at the hands of the people here, shocked at the lack of wedding rings on both married men and sometimes women. I hadn´t really considered it anything strange. My dad doesn´t wear a wedding ring and my mum isn´t particular about hers so I don´t see the lack of one as a sign of anything. They were not only shocked by the lack of wedding rings on married people but also the lack of diamond rings. I hadn´t really thought much about it before but diamond rings are really American. the US must have the largest diamond consumption per capita of anywhere in the world but then again I´m just making that up.

I´m sure this doesn´t have much to do with wedding rings but one thing that does interest me about relationships in Spain is the high instance of infidelity. There is a lot of infidelity in the US but many of those relationships end in divorce. Here people often either stay with their unfaithful partners or just separate.

That was not very coherent but what do you think? If you are married or when you get married, do you/will you wear a wedding ring and for the girls will you wear a diamond ring?

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166 Passengers

6 Crew members

26 Survivers, all injured

I flew into that airport yesterday. When I flew in I thought the landscape was beautiful, now smoke billows from the twisted metal of a Spanair plane and ambulances zoom in and out of the airport. The people on board the plane were bound for Las Palmasfor holiday, they were barely off the runway before they crashed.

It makes me think of all the times I have flown on a plane. I probably take flying for granted. I assume that I will be safe and in all honesty I think I will be. They say you are more likely to have a car accident than a plane accident but I’m sure fatality is more likely in a plane accident than a car accident. I’m not worried about my mortality, I am just sad for the families of those who died in the crash. I will be keeping them in my thoughts.

UPDATE: Only 19 people survived, some are still in critical condition. Of the 22 children on board, only 3 are still alive

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